Aaron Caycedo-Kimura, poet (40)

The other day I decided to make boeuf bourguignon. The recipe I used was intended for an InstantPot, but I had time, so I decided to use the slow cooker method. Perhaps that required more sautéing or some such, but what was billed as "15 minutes" of prep turned into two hours! I know, because I was listening to Pádraig Ó Tuama's delightful podcast Poetry Unbound, and I got through eight 15-minute installments before I switched the cooker on. 

No matter! I had the time! And listening to Pádraig read poems by writers mostly unknown to me, and then discuss them, was educational and inspiring. The final of the eight was this one, by Aaron Caycedo-Kimura:

What’s Kept Alive

She crunches her walker
into the sea of pebbles
surrounding the stepping-stones,

tells me, This bush
with flowers is Japanese.
That one is too, but different.

I hover close behind, ready
with an outstretched arm
as if to give a blessing.

Pick that large weed
near the lantern—by the roots—
and throw it into the pail.

My father planned and planted
this garden fifty years ago—
hidden behind the fence
of their Santa Rosa tract home—

but he’s gone now.
She hires a hand to rake leaves,
prune branches once a month.

Soon she’ll be gone.
I’ll sell the house,
return to Connecticut.

A stranger will buy it,
become caretaker of the garden,
but won’t know that from their

San Francisco apartment
my father transported
the Japanese maple, cradled
in a small clay pot—

the momiji now guarding
the north corner—
and that my mother chided
him for bothering with a dying shrub.

It caused me, once I finally got that stew stewing, to spend a little time journaling about the backyard of my own childhood home, with its weeping willow and Australian tea tree, both now gone, and my father's carefully tended chrysanthemums and dahlias. I ended, "There was the giant poinsettia, which towered over the house—not thick and threatening, but spindly and airy, with those beautiful star-flowers, crimson against blue sky. And St. Francis in stone, underneath. I doubt the poinsettia is still there—it, too, would have died. Francis stands on my deck, sheltered by yellow roses." Here's Francis, before his latest move to the deck. I'm glad I have this sweet memento of my mother.